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Samsung’s Q1 2024 Operating Profit Surged Nearly 933% as Memory-Chip Prices Recovered

Samsung’s operating profit climbed to KRW 6.61 trillion in Q1 2024 as memory-chip pricing and demand recovered, but the weak comparison base and uneven chip businesses put the 931% headline in perspective.
From TheFinanceBase Team3 min to read
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Samsung Electronics reported operating profit of KRW 6.61 trillion for the three months ended March 31, 2024, up from KRW 640 billion a year earlier. The final figures imply a rise of about 932.8%; Samsung’s widely reported 931% figure came from its earlier preliminary estimate. The rebound was led by memory chips recovering from a severe downturn, but it was not proof that every part of Samsung’s semiconductor business had returned to health.

What Samsung’s 931% profit increase actually measures

The figure refers to year-over-year growth in operating profit, not net income or sales. Samsung’s April 5 preliminary announcement estimated first-quarter operating profit at about KRW 6.6 trillion. Its detailed results, released April 30, reported KRW 6.61 trillion, compared with KRW 640 billion in Q1 2023. Calculated from those final figures, the increase is approximately 932.8%.

Revenue rose much less dramatically: consolidated sales were KRW 71.92 trillion for Q1 2024. The gap between revenue growth and operating-profit growth matters. The percentage increase in profit looks especially large because the comparison quarter was unusually weak, rather than because Samsung’s overall business suddenly became ten times larger. Samsung’s Q1 2024 results and Q1 2023 results show the underlying amounts.

How the memory business drove the rebound

In Q1 2023, Samsung’s Device Solutions division—which includes memory, System LSI and foundry—reported an operating loss of KRW 4.58 trillion amid falling memory prices and excess inventory. By Q1 2024, the division had returned to operating profitability, with memory providing the main improvement. Samsung said its Memory Business returned to profit as demand and prices improved across DRAM and NAND.

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This was a combination of industry-cycle repair and product mix, not simply a sudden surge in the number of chips sold. After the 2023 slump, producers cut output and worked through inventories. As supply and demand became better balanced, pricing improved. At the same time, demand strengthened in servers, storage, PCs and mobile devices, and Samsung focused on higher-value products including high-bandwidth memory (HBM), DDR5, server SSDs and UFS 4.0. Samsung’s Q1 earnings presentation describes those product priorities.

Where AI fit—and where it did not

Investment in AI data centers was an important catalyst because accelerated computing needs high-bandwidth memory, while data centers also use server DRAM and high-capacity enterprise storage. That demand added to the broader memory recovery and helped support a shift toward higher-value products.

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AI was not the sole explanation for Samsung’s earnings rebound. Better memory pricing, inventory normalization and demand across several end markets also mattered. Nor did growing AI demand automatically benefit every Samsung chip operation equally: HBM product timing, manufacturing yields and customer qualification are distinct challenges from the recovery in conventional DRAM and NAND. System LSI and foundry faced their own demand and utilization conditions.

Other businesses also contributed

Samsung’s Q1 result reflected more than semiconductors. Its Mobile eXperience business reported stronger earnings, supported by sales of the Galaxy S24 series and continued cost management. Visual Display and Digital Appliances improved profitability, while Samsung Display focused on premium QD-OLED products and production efficiency. Samsung also said currency movements contributed about KRW 0.3 trillion to operating profit compared with the previous quarter; this was a quarter-over-quarter effect, not the year-over-year profit increase.

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What the quarter says about the durability of recovery

Q1 2024 was evidence of a meaningful memory-cycle recovery, not a guarantee of sustained growth or a complete semiconductor turnaround. Higher prices, healthier inventories and stronger server demand supported the improvement, and Samsung expected the recovery trend to continue into Q2. That outlook was management’s expectation at the time, not a confirmed result.

Several factors could still change the trajectory: memory remains cyclical; AI-related demand can be concentrated in particular products; and foundry and System LSI do not necessarily move in step with memory. Broader consumer demand, interest rates, geopolitical tensions and exchange rates can also affect results. The very weak Q1 2023 comparison amplified the headline percentage, so the absolute profit and the business mix are more useful measures than the growth rate alone.

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  • BUILT TO LAST UP TO 140K HOURS OF RECORDING: With capacities up to 256GB, the PRO Endurance records and rewrites up to 140K hours (over 16 years); Plus, with a warranty up to 5 years, you can rest assured that your data endures
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What to watch in later results

  • Memory prices and mix: whether improvement extends beyond selected high-value products to broader DRAM and NAND demand.
  • HBM execution: production progress, yields and customer qualification, rather than AI demand in the abstract.
  • Server demand: continued orders for server DRAM and enterprise SSDs.
  • Non-memory semiconductors: utilization and demand in foundry and System LSI, which determine whether recovery broadens beyond memory.
  • Investment: Samsung reported Q1 capital expenditure of KRW 11.3 trillion, including KRW 9.7 trillion in Device Solutions and KRW 1.1 trillion at Samsung Display. The company’s investor-relations disclosure provides the results context.

Product prices and availability are accurate as of the date/time indicated and are subject to change. Any price and availability information displayed on Amazon at the time of purchase will apply.

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